Laurens,
HENRY, statesman; born in
Charleston,
South Carolina, in
1724; was of Huguenot descent,
and was educated in London for mercantile business, in which he
acquired a large fortune. He opposed British aggressions with speech
and in writing, and pamphlets which he published displayed
remarkable legal ability. He was engaged in a military campaign
against the
Cherokees. In 1770 he retired from business, and went to Europe
the next year to superintend the education of his sons; and in
England he did what he could to persuade the government to be just
towards the Americans. On his arrival at Charleston, late in 1774,
he was chosen president of the Provincial Congress and of the
council of safety. In 1776 he was sent as a delegate to the
Continental Congress,
and was president of that body for a little more than a year from
November 1, 1777.

Receiving the appointment of minister to Holland
in 1779, he sailed in the Congress packet Mercury, and on September
3, 1780, she was captured by the frigate Vesta, off the banks of
Newfoundland. Laurens cast his papers overboard, but they were
recovered by a sailor, and the minister was taken to London. After
an examination before the privy council Laurens was committed to the
Tower on a charge of high treason, where he was kept in close
confinement more than a year. He was cruelly deprived of pen, ink,
and paper, and the converse of friends. Twice he was approached with
offers of pardon and liberty if he would serve the ministry, and
each time the offer was indignantly rejected by him. He was finally
released, and at the request of Lord
Shelburne
he went to France, to assist in negotiations then making for peace.
Among his papers recovered from the sea was a plan for a treaty with
Holland; also several letters which disclosed the existing
friendship of the States-General for the Americans. The British
ministry were irritated by these documents and the subsequent
refusal of Holland to disclaim the act of Van Berkel, and Great
Britain declared war against that republic. In December, 1781,
Laurens was appointed one of the commissioners to negotiate for
peace with Great Britain. In November, 1782, he signed a preliminary
treaty at Paris, with Franklin
and John Jay, when he returned home, and
passed the remainder of his life in agricultural pursuits. He died
in Charleston, December 8, 1792, and, in accordance with an
injunction in his will, his body was wrapped in cloths and
burned—the first act of cremation in the United States.

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